THE SNAKE PIT —
SHELBY’S LOCAL LINE-UP
The name ‘Shelby’ is synonymous with high-performance Fords and has been since the mid ’60s when Carroll Shelby’s AC Cobras were the stuff of legends, as was his involvement with the GT40s. However, it was the Shelby Mustangs that launched the Shelby brand into the mainstream automotive world 55 years ago. Spawned in the era of the muscle car, the 1964 Mustangs were the first of the mid-sized sporty and well-handling — for the era — performance cars. Targeted at young people, they were the ‘I’ve got to have it’, ‘I need one now’ icon of the time. Other manufacturers soon followed with the Camaro, Firebird, Challenger, and Barracuda, but the Mustang was the first — hence the term ‘pony car’. It was no surprise then, given Carroll Shelby’s involvement with racing Fords, that in 1965 the first
Shelby Mustang, the GT350, was born, followed in 1967 with the GT500, both of which are now highly collectable cars.
Shelby later moved on to other ventures with other manufacturers, but the GT500 model was revived with his return to Ford in the early 2000s. The new Shelby GT500, revealed in 2006, powered by the 5.4-litre modular V8 fitted with four valve heads and an Eaton supercharger, was conservatively rated at 500hp, significantly more than the 300hp of the Ford Mustang GTs, and successfully relaunched the Ford–Shelby relationship.
In 2007, the Shelby GT-H was again built for the Hertz group, celebrating the 40th anniversary of the legendary GT350H ‘rent a racer’ car of the ’60s and the Shelby-Ford high-performance brand was well and truly alive again.
With the iconic Mustangs now available in markets worldwide in both left-hand and right-hand drive, Shelby responded to the demand for its products, partnering with top-tier manufacturing shops around the globe to make the highly soughtafter Shelby Mustang available to suit their local markets. With a reputation for high-quality, highperformance vehicles from its factory in Las Vegas, Shelby is naturally incredibly selective about its partners, with just six approved Shelby workshops in the world. There are two in Canada, one in South Africa, one in Australia, one in Europe, and the last of them here in Matamata! Matamata Panelworks has long been recognized locally as one of the top restoration and custom shops in the country, but, even so, becoming the Shelby partner in New Zealand was no easy feat. Shelby doesn’t just let anyone join its elite group.
Panelworks’ owner Malcolm Sankey and his team have always built older classics — American and Aussie muscle cars — with customers winning more than their fair share of trophies and many of the vehicles appearing on countless covers of NZV8 over the years.
Malcolm has an obvious passion for older Mustangs, but recently he started getting few customers wanting to get into the late models too. One of them went to Australia to order a Shelby from the team at Mustang Motorsport in Victoria. When he came back, he ripped into Malcolm that, with the shop and team he has, he should pull his finger out and build Shelbys here.
It turned out that Malcolm had been interested in trying to secure the Shelby name and had made a few enquiries and sent a few emails to Shelby US but with no joy. Being flat out with work, he lacked
the time to follow it through any further. Shortly after the rev-up from the Aussie Shelby owner, Malcolm had an enquiry from Tauranga, another potential customer wanting a new Shelby, and that was all the impetus he needed.
With an already hectic workload, Malcolm realized that, to get the Shelby deal over the line, he needed someone with his passion, commitment, and attention to detail; that is, another Malcolm, who could focus on making the Shelby connection a reality. Running through the contacts he had made in the industry over the years and discarding a lot of names, his thoughts kept returning to Ross Prevette. Malcolm had worked with Ross many times over the years with CRC Speedshow and other events, and, after weighing up the pros and cons, he decided to see if Ross was interested. Two days later, Ross met with Malcolm, by which time Ross had emailed Shelby and included a detailed portfolio of some of the cars Matamata Panelworks had built, as well as multiple referees in the industry. It transpired that Ross had met Gary Patterson, the president of Shelby, at the SEMA Show a few years earlier, so he emailed him directly. The next day, Joe Conway, the CEO, emailed back, copying in Gary, to say they were keen to develop the relationship with the team in Matamata.
While Ross and Malcom expected things to move rapidly from that point, they were to learn there was still a lot of hard work to be done, as it was not just a case of ticking the boxes with Shelby. The due diligence extended to contacting a lot of the shop’s customers and other people in the industry in New Zealand to make sure that Malcolm and his crew were up to the task. They then had to be approved by Ford US because of its close relationship with Shelby. They also had to get Ford New Zealand on board with the deal, which involved more hurdles to jump and boxes to tick. That would ultimately enable ‘Shelby NZ’, as it was to be known, to become a Ford New Zealand business partner and have access to the Ford New Zealand dealer network and the associated privileges.
After more than a year of hard work, Shelby NZ finally joined the Shelby team, and Malcolm, Ross, and a few of the crew were in the US learning how to build the Shelby cars. They soon figured out that they could make them even better here,
and several of their local upgrades are now being considered by the team at Shelby US.
Going live at the start of 2020, Shelby NZ set a modest target of cars for the first year. Little did Malcolm and Ross anticipate the appetite of Kiwis to get hold of a Shelby Mustang. By the end of June, even accounting for the six-week shutdown for Covid-19, Shelby NZ had orders 50 per cent ahead of the target for the year. In June, a special Carroll Shelby signature edition was announced, limited globally to 50 cars, with 32 of them to be built in the US and just three available through each of the partner mod shops in the Shelby network. The media release went out at the start of June and Shelby NZ sold its allocation in just three days. It will also be building the only widebody signature edition in the world.
While the special edition is nice, it is the standard range of Shelby Mustangs that will be making up the bulk of the work for Shelby NZ — not that there is much standard about the Shelby range. The Shelby GT is the starting point, with a change of hood, grille, wheels and tyres, suspension, seats, and exhaust, along with a host of other subtle cosmetic upgrades, including the bonnet, which is replaced to improve airflow and cooling. Then there is the GT-H, with the ‘H’ now standing for ‘heritage’ rather than the Hertz of previous years. This is essentially the Shelby GT in the heritage colours of black and gold with gold wheels. The Shelby GT or GT-H can also be ordered supercharged, which boosts the performance from the base Shelby of 480hp to 700-plus horsepower using a Ford Performance supercharger built to Shelby specs. Unlike some other companies, which bolt on a supercharger and call it done, Shelby includes a one-piece aluminium driveshaft, a host of other driveline upgrades, and an improved cooling system with its supercharger option, to complete the package.
If you need a bit more performance, then the Super Snake is the option for you. This is basically a road-going race car, but then things get exciting. Shelby starts with the GT upgrades, and then takes it to another level with more suspension upgrades and a bigger wheel-tyre combo to clear the bigger 16-inch rotors with Brembo calipers developed with Shelby for this car. These are necessary, as the Super Snake is rated at 800-plus horsepower, which in reality is in excess of 825hp at the wheels thanks to the bigger Whipple three-litre supercharger with integral intercooler set-up. Everything Shelby does is over-engineered, with the Shelby extreme cooling system; Brembo braking system; Shelby track suspension package, including upgraded wheel studs; and driveline upgrades such as the Shelby exclusive brake and bearing duct cooling system. The superchargers get a stand-alone water-to-air intercooler and everything else that is built into the car to to ensure they can be raced at the track, meaning they should live forever on the street.
The ultimate road racer’s dream is the Super Snake Wide Body, which, with the new sheet-metal and body upgrades, adds around four inches of track to the rear and two-and-half inches to the front, giving razor-sharp handling that is amazingly even better than the Super Snake! Mechanically, it is not too much different to the Super Snake, but it is fitted with even better Brembo brakes, hardened wheel studs, stronger spindles and hubs, and a distinctive and more aggressive wheel-and-tyre package. If that were not enough, a fully adjustable
Penske coilover suspension option is also available. Obviously, these Wide Body packages add considerable time and cost to your Shelby dream but even the wild Wide Body still comes with the Shelby NZ three-year 60,000km new-car warranty, which is incredible for what is essentially a streetlegal track car.
So, how do they drive compared with the standard Mustang? Well the normally aspirated GT and GT-H, which only have a modest power increase over the standard GT, demonstrate dramatically improved road holding thanks to the Shelby suspension and wheel-tyre upgrades. They also feel a whole heap faster despite there only being 20 or so additional horsepower over the Mustang GT. Add the blower option, though, and it is a whole different ball game. Suddenly, you can’t really compare them at all. Climb into the Super Snake and the moment you touch the start button you realize that this car is something special; the cackle of the tailpipes and the very subtle sound of the supercharger at idle give an inkling of the potential drama that lies
THE MOMENT YOU TOUCH THE START BUTTON YOU REALIZE THAT THIS CAR IS SOMETHING SPECIAL
ahead. Easing away quietly, it does not feel much different to the GT — until you stab the gas. The supercharger howls and the car lunges forward with the massive rear tyres struggling for traction. Yes, it has traction control, but the hit is so quick and hard that you almost feel it is struggling to contain the 825-plus horses that are trying to escape. The gear change up doesn’t change the acceleration at all, neither does the next. The acceleration is linear and doesn’t drop off until the right foot is moved from the gas to the brake as the corner comes up way quicker than expected. That is when the second shock occurs; the Super Snake sheds speed so fast, thanks to the massive Brembos, that suddenly we are going into the bend like Nana on a Sunday drive. That’s when you understand that this car is so much better than most who will ever be driving it. The racing heritage is evident in the way it brakes, accelerates, and hustles around the curves; it is a driver’s car that, while happy being used around town, just yearns for the track.
The Super Snake is a weapon, but when you add the widebody package it somehow moves to the next level. The wide 305/30R20 Michelins from the back of the Super Snake are now the front, looking right at home in the new wider front sheet metal, with huge 345/30R20s tucked in under the pumped-out rear panels. With the custom hubs adding to the wider track, the Wide Body has a menacing look to it, almost making the Super Snake look demure. The drive does not disappoint, either, with the Wide Body feeling even more stable and predictable. It has a real Jekyll and Hyde feel about it, happy cruising along with the traffic around town, idling quietly until it’s time not to! Its performance is simply stunning, and there will be very few who find the limits of this car. With the added wheel track and even better brakes than the Super Snake, the Wide Body lets even amateurs feel like Carroll Shelby must have back in the day. Climbing out of the widebody Shelby, feeling the rush of adrenaline subside and the endorphins that left you euphoric dissipate, the desire for more comes over you, the urge for just one more drive for the day — that is what the Shelby Super Snake Wide Body makes you feel; it’s addictive!